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THURSDAY. FEBRUARY 25. 1971
LINCOLN, NEBRASKA
VOL. 94 NO. 69
GQffiffi
Carpenter would submit student regent bill
by STEVE STRASSER
Staff Writer
State Sen. Terry Carpenter
said Wednesday night he
would introduce a bill in the
Unicameral calling for a
constitutional amendment
permitting students to elect a
voting student member to the
Board of Regents-if students
can draw up a suitable bill.
"I can't assure you the bill
would get out of the
Government Committee,"
Carpenter said, "but I think it
would."
The idea was brought up at
a Cather Hall rap session by
Centennial College freshman
Jim Fullmer, who promised to
consult with law college
students about drafting the
proposal.
"Once the bill gets to the
floor of the Legislature it
would be up to students to
lobby it through and to gain
popular support at the .polls"
Carpenter continued. "You
won't do it without a col
lective effort."
"Stand up for what you
believe in," Carpenter told the
75 students at the discussion.
"Don't sit around on the
sidelines."
Carpenter gave Fullmer a
"standing invitation" to bring
him a bill, commenting that a
Board with a student on it
"couldn't do any worse than
the present Board."
The Legislature "doesn't
really know what the needs of
the University are," Carpenter
said in the discussion. "But we
don't trust the faculty and we
don't trust the Board of
Regents.
"You've only got 49 men
and women in the Legislature,"
Carpenter continued. "We're
not particularly expert on
anything." That is one reason
behind a resolution passed
earlier in this session urging
that the Regents acquire a
professional staff to
competently determine
University needs, he explained.
Carpenter said the proposed
staff should also be responsible
to the governor and
Legislature.
"Nobody has ever helped
the University more than I
have," Carpenter said. "But
now I'm sick and tired of being
used. From now on the
University has toprove its needs
to me."
Carpenter singled out
Chancellor D. B. Varner as one
NU official who had tried to
use him.
Calling Varner a "con
man", the veteran senator said
"the people of Michigan were
glad to get rid of him. All he
knew how to do was spend
money."
Carpenter said he didn't
know if the University could
operate on Gov. J. J. Exon's
proposed budget. The State
Senator told the students "you
don't know either."
He said the Governor's
University budget proposal
would probably get through
the Unicameral because you
need 33 votes to override the
governor, and they're awful
hard to come by."
The Legislature could
always be reconvened to
appropriate more money if
Exon's budget is to crippling,
Carpenter added. But for now
"let's give the governor a
chance to assume leadership."
ASUN asks for minority recruiting
A resolution calling for the University to
develop policies and procedures aimed at
recruiting and holding students, faculty, and
administrators from minority groups "at
least in proportion to their percentage of
population in the state" was unanimously
passed by ASUN Wednesday.
Sen. Bill Arfman's successful motion also
urged the development of an ethnic studies
program so all students could be exposed to
various cultures in the United States.
In action related to the current session
of the State Legislature, the Senate directed
the ASUN Legislative Liason Committee to
lobby for ASUN on four bills:
-TO OPPOSE LB 773, which would put
the self-defense law (recently overturned by
the State Supreme Court) on the ballot;
-TO OPPOSE LB 643, a bill to establish
a seven member coordinating committee in
charge of all higher education in Nebraska.
The committee would consist entLvly of
State Legislators;
-TO SUPPORT A BILL designed to
require government agencies to replace
housing taken by expansion. The bill, LB
190, could affect the University in its
movement toward the Malone district.
ASUN deferred judgement on a bill to
provide a new law building and on another
which related -to food -stamp distribution
until more could be learned about the bills
and their effects.
A constitutional amendment making the
Second Vice President of ASUN an
appoiniive office rather than elected was
proposed by Speaker Pro-Tem TimKincaid.
The amendment would be placed on this
spring's student government ballot and be
implemented in the 1972 spring elections, if
successful. The proposal was automatically
tabled for consideration until next week.
ALSO POSTPONED until next week was
an appeal from the Student Volunteer
Council for funds to help purchase a truck
for use in volunteer work.
Jim Pipher, a member of the Council,
told ASUN Senators that transportation is
the "number one difficulty of volunteer
programs" at the University. He said ASUN
funds would be combined with other money
for the purchase.
In other business, Sen. Bruce Wimmer
withdrew a motion directed toward an
evaluation of the Arts and Sciences language
requirement because it was discovered that
such a project was already in progress.
THE SENATE approved the
constitutions of the Human Relations
Insight League and the Geology Club and
accepted the nomination of Dave Bingham
to the post of Electoral Commissioner.
The ASUN-RHA Book Exchange,
according to Sen. Roy Baldwin, did about
$4200 business. Unfortunately, about $240
was lost to shoplifters.
- BALDWIN SAID he would suggest ways
to prevent the theft at the next ASUN
meeting.
Because of the snowstorm, applications
for the Senate post from Engineering and
Architecture will be taken until next
Wednesday's ASUN meeting.
Brown on discrimination:
'Regents directive not threat'
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Brown "an educational task and not a matter of
threat or force."
by GARY SEACREST
Staff Writer
The Board of Regents
directive for all student
organizations to comply with
the Regents anti-discrimination
policy should not be
viewed as a threat to the Greek
system, according to Russell H.
Brown, dean for student
development.
"Our main objective is to
eliminate discrimination as it is
practiced by groups and
individuals and this is basically
an educational task and not a
matter of threat or force,"
Brown explained Wednesday.
"The role we want to play is to
help groups eliminate racial
discrimination."
MANY MEMBERS of
fraternities and sororities have
alleged that the University
administration would like to
see many Greek houses lose
their official University
sanction because of racial
discrimination.
Brown, who is heading the
effort to collect the statements
of compliance from
organizations, denied that the
administration was anti-Greek
and predicted that all student
organizations will be able to
comply with the Board's
anti-discrimination policy.
"But just signing a
statement does not mean a
poup does not discriminate,"
Brown remarked. "The main
task is to take follow up action
that will help eliminate racial
discrimination."
THE REGENTS
DIRECTED that all student
organizations submit a
statement by Febr. 15 stating
that the organizations' mem
bership practices "comply
clearly and without
qualification" with the
Regents' anti-discrimination
policy or lose its permission to
exist on campus at the end of
the 1970-71 academic year.
Brown said his job"was just
to get from the groups a
statement of compliance and
provide information to the
Regents on which groups
didn't respond."
The dean said almost all
the University's 270
organizations have responded
to the Regents directive.
Although noting that some
organizations did not meet the
Feb. IS deadline. Brown said
he didn't think groups "will be
punished" because of tardiness
in complying with the Regents
policy. "Our main interest," he
said, "is having the
organizations respond and not
punishing them."
As an example, Brown
noted that some organizations
did not meet the Feb. IS
deadline because the statement
was sent to former presidents
who ignored it.
Brown said that any
organization that did not
comply with the Regents'
directive has been contacted by
the Office of Student Affairs
and asked why it didn't
respond. "We will work with
any organization that is having
trouble signing the statement,
he added.
THE INFORMATION
concerning the responses from
student organizations will be
forwarded to the Regents,
according to Brown.
Regent Edward
Schwartzkopf of Lincoln said
Wednesday that the Board has
not decided what it is going to
do with the information Brown
forwards.
"If the organizations are in
compliance," he speculated,
"there's no need to take action
except to commend them for
complying."
Six of the eight members
of the Board are alumni of NU
fraternity houses.
John W. Robinson,
chairman of the Council on
Student Life, said the Council
will continue its study of racial
discrimination this semester.
However, he said he didn't
know what action CSL would
take in the area.
THE COUNCIL last year
created an ad hoc Committee
on Racial Discrimination to
investigate if the membership
in student organizations are
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